Lonesome Day
by make it stop jamie
Summary: All Seth has to do is get through this lonesome day
1. It's rainin' but there ain't

Disclaimer: Don't own the OC, Rooney, the Eagles, the song "Lonesome Day" (Bruce Springstein and the E Street Band, _The Rising) _or Christopher Ralph (not yet at least).

Author's Notes: First thing you should know is that I'm extremely sleep deprived right now. I had to stay at my work until 1:30 in the morning and didn't get to sleep until after 2 and then I had to work from 10:30 in the morning today until six. So I apologize for any overlooked errors and the ending. My goal for this story was to get a chapter out everyday, but it hasn't really worked out that way, but I'm going to work at least a little each day. This story is based on the movie _Elephant_. The movie deals with school violence and so will this story. I'm warning you now that three main characters will die. Sorry, for the long notes, but there was a lot of stuff I had to get out.

Lonesome Day

Chapter 1

Once I thought I knew

Everything I needed to know about you

But I didn't really know all that much

Ryan Atwood walked through the hallways of Harbor High School that were currently busting at the seams with the lunch rush with Rooney in a continuous loop in his head. Of course, it was just one song, "Pop Stars", and it wasn't even the whole song. _These are the words of the pop stars The I'm so sophisticated money making machines The killers of rock and roll,_ kept on cycling through his head, as he stumbled around clusters of fellow students.

Seth had had that song playing on the way to school that morning and since Seth had been unusually quiet the song had a chance to ingrain itself into Ryan's head. It wasn't that Ryan had anything against Rooney, he didn't, it was just that he would preferred to have something else in his head. Something that was a little more his style, like the Eagles. He would have loved to have "Hotel California" in his head. Oh well, the side effects of living with an Emo geek.

"Hey Ryan, is Kevin Ziggers is in your history class, right?" Ryan heard Seth ask from just behind him and turned to see his almost brother squeezing through the crowds to catch up to him.

Ryan was surprised by this particular greeting and shot him his famous and so classic why-are-you-asking-me-this look. It wasn't necessarily the question that surprised Ryan (although, he was a bit puzzled by it), it was the way Seth went about asking it that surprised Ryan. Normally, it took Seth a good five minutes to get his point. Seth was without a doubt not acting, like the Seth, Ryan had grown to know.

"I'll take that as a yes," Seth stated making Ryan even more confused, "Was he in class today?"

"Why do you want to know?" Ryan asked, soothing his confusion with the thought that Seth's mind sometimes works in mysterious ways.

"You don't need to know," Was Seth's simple explanation.

Finally, realizing that he wasn't going to get a reasonable explanation for Seth's odd behavior (and for Seth that was saying something) Ryan tried to figure out if Kevin had in fact come to class. Ryan knew who Kevin was, he was the small dark haired kid who sat towards the back of the classroom and was constantly the butt of Luke and his posse's (of course they weren't really Luke's posse anymore) jokes and teasing. Sometimes it got so bad that Ryan broke his silence and told them to knock it off on a count of feeling sorry for the poor kid. Yesterday had been so bad that Marissa had been the one to yell at the jerks, "No, he wasn't," Ryan replied as he remembered thinking that Kevin probably hadn't wanted to show his face at school after the torture had endured the day before and frankly Ryan didn't blame him.

They reached Ryan's locker and he quickly started doing his combination, "Well, I'm going to go now," Seth said a little impatiently from over Ryan's shoulder, just as Ryan was about to roll his last number under the little white line at the top of the lock's dial. Ryan turned to look over his shoulder just as Seth disappeared into the crowd. He thought about going after him and to try find out what was going on, but decided against it. He didn't want to leave the building for some reason and he didn't think that _The killers of rock and roll,_ had anything to do with it.


	2. a cloud in the sky

Author's Notes: Sorry, this took me so long to get out. But, I just graduated from high school and then I took two trips with three days in between them and top of that I'm moving cross-country. This story takes place after "The Goodbye Girl". So nobody knows about Luke's little affair. Oh, thanks to sparkycola1 for guilting me into writing this chapter. If you guys ever want me to write more of a story just review or email me. Thanks, also to hotterthnu and paints-the-sky for reviewing the first chapter! Enjoy! BTW, the song in the chapter names is "Waitin' on a Sunny Day" by Bruce Springsteen.

Lonesome Day

Chapter 2

The joke's on me, but it's gonna be okay

If I can just get through this lonesome day

Luke Ward stood in the doorway of Harbor High School's student union. His eyes drifted from face to face, looking for one in particular. He hoped she was here. He didn't want to have to spend his whole lunch break looking for her. And he had to talk to her. He had to tell her. Today it had hit him just how much he was hurting her. Again. He didn't want to anymore. He was through hurting and lying to Marissa Cooper. If he had to give up a totally awesome women in the process, than so be it.

Finally, he spotted her sitting reading on a couch towards the back of the room. He hurried through the lunch crowd to get to her. He didn't want to lose his nerve. He couldn't lose his nerve. He didn't want to break her heart, again, but he knew that it was the right thing do.

His heart was pounding when he sat down next to her on the couch. She lowered her book and smiled when she saw it was him. Boy, was she beautiful and boy, was he was the biggest jerk to mess things up with her. Again.

"I have to tell you something," He struggled to get out as he skipped over the pleasantries. He didn't have time for pleasantries. He could already feel the words that he had gone over in his head while his teachers droned on, disappear.

"Okay," She said the smile still on her face. Completely unaware that Luke Ward was going to turn her world upside down. Again. Damn, he had just gotten her to be civil with him again.

"It's about your mom," He said slowly, hating what he was about to say.

"What about her?" She asked as the smile drained from her face. He wished he had taken a picture of it. He knew that he wouldn't be seeing it again for a while. By the time they graduated if he was lucky. Of course, that was only if Summer and Ryan didn't beat him to a pulp before graduation.

He turned his head away from her and faced the pool tables. What other high school had pool tables? He didn't want to see the look on her face when he said what he was about to say, "I've been doing her,"

He wished he had blessed with the gift of eloquence. Or at least tact.


	3. Must have been a tear from your eye

Author's Notes: You guys are awesome! Thank you, reviewer, Molly4 (this chapter is a bit longer), Ocfan4u (now you get to find out what's up with Seth) and paints-the-sky (glad I could make your day). I'm sorry if I went a little over board with the Seth ramblings, but my mind works in mysterious ways, too. Enjoy!

Lonesome Day

Chapter 3

Hell's brewin' , dark sun's on the rise

This storm'll blow through by and by

Seth pushed his way through the main doors of Harbor and stood out on the concrete landing. It was one of those weird California days, warm enough not to have to wear a jacket, but cloudy none the less. If he had been any other place than Orange County he would have thought a storm was on it's way. But, this was Orange County and storms only happened in December and January (earlier or later if there was an El Nino) and sometimes in June if it was particularly gloomy (as in June Gloom). Even then it didn't really "storm" as much as the newscasters wanted to believe it. But, this was the middle of March and it never rained for the "ides of March"

Seth knew he should do something other then just ponder the weather, but he didn't know what.

When he had ran into Ryan he had just wanted to get outside, but now that he was he didn't know what to do.

Suddenly four letters popped into his head "WWRD". What would Ryan do? He knew that it was probably sacrilegious to put his brother's name in place of Jesus', but he was fairly certain that the latter would be able to give him more guidance at the moment.

So what would Ryan do?

What Ryan do if a friend (okay, Kevin had never really been a friend, an ally yes, but friend no, Kevin had never even picked up an X-Men comic, but neither had Ryan, but that was besides the point, what was his point anyways?) had instant messaged him (but then again Ryan wasn't really into AIM, he did have a screen name, but he never went on, Seth knew because he was on Seth's Buddy List) him out of the blue (and it was out of the blue Kevin hadn't spoken to Seth since the end of last school year because Seth had "sold out") and told him to stay at home because there was "heavy shit" going down tomorrow (today, because he had received the message last night)?

Ryan wouldn't have gawked at the computer screen for five whole minutes as Kevin logged off. Ryan wouldn't have let the girl he cared about most, come to school knowing that if the shit was going to fall it would most likely fall on her. Ryan wouldn't have left his brother in the building that was soon to become a hell hole worst than the streets of Chino.

Ryan would have gotten in the Land Rover (with or without permission, the parents would understand after they found out that he had talked a poor soul out of committing the next Columbine) driven over to Kevin's house and tried to talk some sense into him and that hadn't worked he would have tried to beat some sense into him and he might have even told the parents.

Ryan would not have waited to freakin' lunch time when the day would was half over, to take action.

Ryan would certainly not have stood on the steps for five minutes like an idiot, while his girlfriend was yelling his surname in an increasingly irritated manner. She was almost in rage blackout mode.

Seth Cohen was not Ryan Atwood and Seth Cohen, unlike Ryan Atwood, knew that this day hadn't even started to get bad.


End file.
